Plug mule named Jim had horse sense

When I walk down into the pasture and scratch one of the horses behind his ears, I think of old Jim.

Jim was a mule, and you didn’t catch him in open pasture.

Jim knew the facts of farm life. He suspected that anybody headed toward him with a bucket of sweet feed wasn’t coming for a love fest, so he took off for the woods to hide.

Jim’s role wasn’t to be sleek and pretty and eat grass 24 hours a day. Neither did Jim want you messing with his ears. That always meant a bridle, followed by a collar and hames — equipment needed to hitch him to a plow.

Jim didn’t like to plow, but when he plowed, he went solo because he was so cantankerous Dad couldn’t pair him with another mule.

I find myself trying to compare Jim to the horses, which are still novelties to our family. But comparisons may not be fair to either the horses, all well-fed geldings, or Jim, tall, and lanky and obviously of raw-boned working-class stock.

I try to compare their intellect. The horses are smart enough to come trotting up for a bucket of sweet feed and to get their heads rubbed, but Jim usually foresaw his fate and galloped off to escape the bridle and plow.

Jim knew that if he pushed hard against the patched barbed-wire fence, he could go exploring the neighborhood. The horses may be smarter, though. They avoid barbed wire in any condition. Why should they escape the good life?

I’m not sure the horses can tell time, but Jim could. Plowing made him hungry and he headed for the barn at noon. You couldn’t stop him. He also knew that 6 p.m. was quitting time. He would balk, refusing to plow more rows.

I also remember that Jim once pulled plows up one side of cotton rows and down the other side to help us make a living on land where these semi-fancy horses now frolic. Their only worries are the flies that annoy them constantly.

Life isn’t necessarily fair, even for an old plug mule.